Why Did Cameran Eubanks Leave ‘Southern Charm’?

Chalk it up to another crappy gift from the year 2020, but it’s true: Cameran Eubanks announced in the spring that she would be leaving Southern Charm ahead of the seventh season of the Bravo series. How the Charleston crew will fare without their voice of reason remains to be seen throughout Season 7.

Her pals Chelsea Meissner and Naomie Olindo appeared to join her in solidarity by also announcing they would not be returning to the show, though a big (understandable!) factor for all these women was that they didn’t want to let viewers into their personal lives and relationships that they cherish. Which also turned out to be a significant reason for Cameran to turn away from the cameras.

Rumors quickly rose about Cameran’s husband Jason Wimberly, who has stayed away from Southern Charm for the six seasons his wife spent on the show. She generously shared her friendships and even her pregnancy leading up to the birth of their daughter Palmer. But with the exception of a quick glance during Patricia Altschul’s finale party at the end of Season 6, Jason was never part of the show. So when whispers of Jason having an affair started to circulate, Cam was left with no choice but to put her foot down.

On May 3, Cameran took to Instagram to defend herself, her husband, and their marriage, by saying, “What upsets me the most is that my husband, who is the most sincere and faithful human I know is being falsely dragged into this. It disgusts me. He always supported me filming the show even though he wanted no part of the spotlight.”

She went on to say, “My decision was made and given to Bravo months ago and had absolutely nothing to do with ridiculous and fake rumors about my marriage. Please disregard any fabricated rumor. It’s a ploy for ratings and that’s it. Now I absolutely know I was smart to leave the party early. My gut has never failed me.”

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A post shared by Cameran Eubanks (@camwimberly1) on May 13, 2020 at 7:46pm PDT

However, even though Cameran is no longer part of the show, unfortunately, this rumor still is. This season will find the cast questioning its validity (and its source) and one of Cameran’s best friends, Leva Bonaparte, joins as a full-time cast member who isn’t afraid to shut the others down when necessary (which is often).

Cameran has been open about wanting to spend more time with her family, especially her adorable daughter, and while her absence from the show is a bummer, it’s not at all a surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention. Plus, with this season tackling the coronavirus and Black Lives Matter movement, it’s probably for the best that Cam decided to hang at home with her family and watch her new favorite Netflix documentary. We’ll miss her, but we don’t blame her.

UPDATE, January 29, 2021: Now that we’ve seen Part 1 of the Southern Charm Season 7 reunion we have some more answers, and even more questions. When the topic of Cameran’s absence from this season came up, Leva admitted, “I haven’t really heard from her since I started filming,” and added, “I assume she just didn’t want to know anything about the show.” However, Craig Conover’s opinion was that, “I think she’s upset she didn’t do it,” and explained, “She liked being a part of the group and I think she just bowed out, I can’t tell you exactly why.” He also revealed that he thought she would be a part of the season right up until the last minute. He said that he, Shep, and Cameran all agreed, celebrated, and planned to start filming the next day, but that she had a change of heart “in the eleventh hour.” As Craig remembered, “We were all in, and the next day we showed up to film and I got a call from Cameran [that] said, ‘You’re gonna hate me, I’m not doing it this year’. And that was the last thing I heard from her.”

Kathryn Dennis, the person who brought up the cheating rumor on the show, added that, “She was offered to come back and film several times, probably up until this month,” and also wanted to make it clear that, “She made the decision not to return to this show before anything happened with rumors and anything like that.” In fact, nearly everyone at the reunion supported this claim and backed Kathryn up, with most saying there is absolutely no truth to the actual rumor.

For his part, Austen Kroll disagreed with Craig’s opinion, and as Shep Rose is one of the few people that has kept in touch with her, he said, “She’s got a nice little situation. I stay out of it. When she’s like, ‘Oh, I’m struggling,’ I’m not gonna try and talk you into something.” And as her friend Danni Baird added, “Cameran likes control of her life and I think the show was kind of an outlier.”

So what have we learned? Well, ultimately…nothing. The real reason for Cameran’s departure from the show this season remains something only she really knows, but we know that she was missed throughout Season 7.

Southern Charm airs Thursday at 9pm ET/PT on Bravo. 

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